Monday, November 26, 2012

BIGGEST BARN

This was an article I wrote for the local paper, and I thought I would post it even though it reads a little differently.

In its day this classic Grey County, Ontario, timber frame barn was
said to be the biggest barn in the county.

This was a big achievement as there were many big and tall
barns built in the late 19th century made from the thick hardwood
and pine forests where there were plenty of big trees.

Originally built by John Blyth in 1886 in former Normanby
Township, south of Durham, this barn served Blyth’s 225 acres adequately. He
became the MPP for the region under the Conservative banner in 1879 but
suddenly died in 1895 at the age of 45, leaving his wife and nine children.

His sons James and John took over the farm and they reshaped
the barn to what it looks like today. Many farmers during the early 20th
century were expanding their operations, building additions to their barns or
even moving neighbouring ones to be joined to their existing barns.The Blyth children added another 20 feet to
the overall length, making it almost 100 feet long, but it was the roof and
sides that was quite an accomplishment. The old roof and its supporting timbers
were taken down and another new set of posts and six roof purlins were
assembled, raising the roof higher to over 50 feet and almost 60 feet if the
foundation height was added. It was incredible how these old heavy timbers and
pole rafters were first taken down and new ones erected without our modern
cranes, but using the skills acquired with blocks and pulleys and by the use of
gin poles. It was at this time, when some of the first rafters were being put
up and men were at the top that one of them announced he could see Lake Huron,
a distance of 58 kilometers.

The Blyth’s were specializing in shorthorn cattle, but pigs
were also kept in the stables under the small straw barn, which was unchanged
since it was initially built. It was a busy time providing feed for the
livestock.Turnips were grown on a six
acre field for feed and each one had to be pulled out by hand in cold November
days and then hauled into the barn. Part of the back of the stables, a section
10 feet wide and the length of the barn was converted into a root cellar for
this important feed supply. It worked so well that a silo was not built on the
farm until the 1970’s.To make the
turnips into small chewable bits for the cattle and pigs, they were put through
a “pulper,” which was operated by turning a large handle, a difficult manual
job. But the dirtiest harvest work was threshing hard peas, which was also used
for feeding cattle and mixed with oats for feeding pigs. The peas were cut with
a mower bar that had a special attachment, which cut and then rolled the peas
and stems into a bundle.There was
always a lot of dirt left over on the stems and pea pods and threshing the crop
became very dusty work.

This farm operation used so much grain that it used to take
three days to thresh the crop. The massive grain bins used to store the grain
measured 35 feet by 42 feet, with two doors leading to ten huge bins. When the
crop was harvested by reaper binders, the sheaves were brought into the barn
and stored there until the threshing crews came. There were so many sheaves in
the east part of the barn that they reached the top plate of the barn, about 35
feet.

The stable floor was different than most as it was made from
short logs of cedar standing on end and then the spaces in between filled in
with sand. It was quite durable, did not get muddy like a dirt floor but was
harder to clean as the shovel would hit the tops of the cedar as they were a
bit uneven.

The structure still stands today, a show barn to the
expertise of timber framers of the 19th and early 20th
centuries and can be seen on Concession 2 just west of Highway 6.

About Me

We have lived on our farm since 1984 and I have been notching timber frames for most of those years. I became more interested in repairing old barns and now provide a service inspecting all aspects of the barn structure. As well, I have been a reporter with local newspapers, magazines, and as a result of my barn interest wrote two books on barns.